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From the Friends TV show:

Monica: I have some pretty exciting news.
Phoebe: You're pregnant!

Monica was in a relationship and had expressed that she wanted kids, but didn't have a tummy and hadn't given any hint whatsoever that she may be pregnant.

Is there a word to describe these guesses that may be technically feasible but that are very exaggerated?

It's somewhat like the domino effect meme

For example:

  • You posted a picture of a house. Did you buy it?!
  • Well that's a ____. No, I didn't, I just like taking pictures.
Laurel
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Maria Ines Parnisari
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    @KannEt thanks. Posted a sentence. I did some research. I found the domino effect meme, which led me to the "slippery slope" logical fallacy, but it's not exactly what i'm looking for.. – Maria Ines Parnisari Nov 15 '21 at 06:29
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    leap fits well into the hollow sentence proposed. If I have time and the inclination later I might dig out some citations to support my suggestion. – High Performance Mark Nov 15 '21 at 06:31
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    Wild guess. But neither of the responses you list are really odd in the circumstances. – Xanne Nov 15 '21 at 09:20
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    @HighPerformanceMark: Yes, the meaning being leap of intuition although it would rarely be spelled out. – Ben Voigt Nov 15 '21 at 20:02
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    @HighPerformanceMark it's probably a bit of a Britishism, but a bit of a leap would be a sarcastically understated way of putting it. – Ken Y-N Nov 16 '21 at 07:09
  • @MariaInesParnisari Could you rephrase all of that, for clarity? As it stands, any Answer must rely more on quesswork than anything actually Posted in the Question… First and foremost, "You post a random picture of a house Someone: You bought a house!" is no kind of Question… – Robbie Goodwin Nov 17 '21 at 22:46

3 Answers3

48

How about jumping to conclusions?

Defined by Wikipedia as:

a psychological term referring to a communication obstacle where one "judge[s] or decide[s] something without having all the facts; to reach unwarranted conclusions"

With respect to the updated example sentence you could use

… that’s a [big] leap / that’s a [huge] jump … etc

Or you could remove the article:

… that’s jumping to conclusions

Jim
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9

The word you are looking for is presumption (noun), presume (verb). You could alternately use assumption (noun), assume (verb).

Quoting from Lexico

Presumption (noun)
An idea that is taken to be true on the basis of probability.

Quoting from Lexico

Assumption (noun)
A thing that is accepted as true or as certain to happen, without proof.

This is close to the idiom "jumping to conclusion".

AncientSwordRage
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Megha
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    Screenshots are bad because they don't work with screen readers, user style sheets, or other accessibility features, so the blind or visually impaired will have problems as may people who prefer e.g. dark mode viewing. And links can break. It's always better to quote text (and attribute properly). – Stuart F Nov 15 '21 at 09:20
  • @Stuart F thanks a lot for the heads up, I will change the screenshots just quoting the text and leave the link for further details. – Megha Nov 15 '21 at 12:29
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    @KannE thanks for the warm welcome. I will remove the screenshots and leave only quotes, to make it easier to read. – Megha Nov 15 '21 at 12:31
  • I sprinkled some markdown on your answer, and got rid of the links to images that were left over. Now the OP has provided an example sentence, you could [edit] in how your suggestions fit, like "This works in the example sentence: 'Well that's a presumption. No, I didn't, I just like taking pictures.' " – AncientSwordRage Nov 16 '21 at 16:12
6

a stab in the dark

noun phrase

: a guess that is based on very little or no information or evidence

  • They don't really know how much the work will cost. They're just taking a stab in the dark.

Merriam-Webster

Mari-Lou A
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    I'd suggest that "shot in the dark" is probably better known (Google Ngram shows that since ~1908, 'shot' is more common than 'stab') – costrom Nov 15 '21 at 14:34
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    But the person doing this knows they're making a wild guess, often saying "I'm going to take a stab in the dark here and say...". They wouldn't say "you're pregnant!", they'd say "ummm...you're pregnant?" – Owen Reynolds Nov 15 '21 at 14:38
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    I don't think this is a good fit, firstly because it emphasises uncertainty in the guess, whereas in OP's case there may be absolute certainty, it's just not correct or warranted; secondly because it's usually/always said about one's own guess (perhaps for the first reason, little odd to tell someone how sure they are about something). – OJFord Nov 16 '21 at 10:09
  • @OJFord the question has since been clarified and an example sentence provided which was missing when I posted my answer. – Mari-Lou A Nov 16 '21 at 10:57
  • @Mari-LouA That's fair enough, just commenting for the sake of someone (perhaps non-native speaker) reading later really. – OJFord Nov 16 '21 at 11:13
  • Althought I know you've said the question was updated with an example sentence after you posted, could you still [edit] in how your suggestion fits? – AncientSwordRage Nov 16 '21 at 16:22